


here comes the sun

by shier



Category: iKON (Kpop)
Genre: Alternate Universe, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-03
Updated: 2016-02-14
Packaged: 2018-05-18 01:08:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 16,844
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5892271
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shier/pseuds/shier
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>as seen on tumblr: “you’re a celebrity who just broke up and i tweeted you a selfie with the caption “date me” as a joke but you thought i was serious?” au.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

“Bobby broke up with his girlfriend,” Donghyuk half-whispers into the silent room. The problem with the serenity prayer, Junhwe finds, is that when you’re ready to snap pencils and necks, you won’t be able to find the time to _remember_ it. It’s too fucking long.  
  
Judging from the shifty glances Donghyuk occasionally throws in Junhwe’s direction, he’s well aware that Donhyuk’s trying to be quiet because he _knows_ that Junhwe has three papers due in the next two days. Regardless of his intentions, Donghyuk’s failing. Spectacularly.  
  
“Really?” Yunhyeong’s voice comes next.And in all honesty, things would move along faster (i.e. Junhwe’s ability to bullshit) if Yunhyeong and Donghyuk would just _leave_ , but there’s a thunderstorm raging and Donghyuk had made his pitiable face and Junhwe, much to his own disdain, can’t quite say no to that. “The actress? Or is he onto that singer he featured last year?”  
  
“Actress,” Donghyuk replies, with another glance up at Junhwe. “I thought they’d last.”  
  
“I can’t believe you’re making speculations about a stranger’s _life_ ,” Junhwe finally says, unable to hold it in any longer. “Who cares?”  
  
“Approximately ten major news sites do,” Yunhyeong replies, thumbing at Donghyuk’s phone, presumably browsing through those ten major sites that are clearly experiencing some sort of record-breakingly slow news day. “Oh, he tweeted. Lyrics from his debut album.”  
  
“Pretentious asshole,” Junhwe says, at the same time that Donghyuk says, “I hope he’s okay.”  
  
“How come you never show this level of concern for me?” Junhwe questions, shifting on the bed so Donghyuk can see his disgusted expression better, crushing his revision notes in the process.  
  
“That’s because you _sabotage_ your own relationships,” Yunhyeong points out.  
  
“Telling them that they should get their lives together is _not_ sabotage,” Junhwe insist, because his motto in life had always been Honest and Realistic. Anyone who lived by any other sort of rules was clearly in denial and it was in no way Junhwe’s fault that the guy had taken absolute offence at being called an “unmotivated slob” who was “clearly not gonna do shit with his life”.  
  
“You could’ve let him down a little bit gentler,” Donghyuk agrees, but he’s using that soft, pitying tone of his that he claims isn’t pitying, but is often accompanied with a pat to Junhwe’s shoulder. “He’d just migrated back here. His father was _sick_.”  
  
“When the going gets tough—“  
  
“The tough gets going,” Yunhyeong and Donghyuk both chime after him, sounding exasperated but used to it. “We get it.”  
  
“Besides,” Junhwe continues, because his sole goal in life was to live a life comfortable enough for him to take a year-long vacation, “the dude’s gonna live. He probably has five cars and an ATM card made out of gold. If I were him, I wouldn’t care if _I_ were dating someone or not.”  
  
“Of course _you_ would say that,” Donghyuk murmurs.  
  
“Just because you guys are dating now doesn’t mean you can get to be elitist about my love life,” Junhwe counters, rolling his eyes as Yunhyeong stole the opportunity to sprawl all over Donghyuk and shower him with kisses. Just his luck that his room-mate’s dating his best friend, and it’s just his luck that he happened to be here to see all of their firsts. And hear them too. “You guys should be thanking _me_ for helping you find true fucking love.”  
  
“Want us to return the favour?” Yunhyeong teases. “There’s always online dating.”  
  
“I want to get laid, not murdered,” Junhwe returns, ending the conversation by picking up one stack of his (slightly crushed) notes.  
  
“One might be easier than the other,” Donghyuk says, only to have Junhwe chuck his eraser in their general direction. He misses, of course, to which they laugh raucously then quiet down having, presumably, seen the light and decided to move on with their lives.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
To Junhwe’s misfortune, they didn’t.  
  
“So,” Donghyuk starts, three hours later over a giant box of pizza, “how do you feel about going on a date?”  
  
“The last time you hooked me up—“ Junhwe starts, ready to launch into a why-your-taste-is-shit-and-should-be-kept-out-of-my-life rant that he’s really good at because he’s had so many chances to practice it. Donghyuk’s well-meaning; Junhwe just doesn’t have the same patience he does to see the good in everyone.  
  
“That was a mistake,” Donghyuk concedes. The three of them share a look at the joint memory of having to bail Junhwe out from a date with Donghyuk’s course senior when the guy would _not_ stop trying to make Junhwe laugh. _Suffering of the highest level_ , Junhwe’d said as they evacuated the crime scene under the pretense that he was suffering from a lesser known stomach condition. “I should have let you vetoed him first. Who knew your type wasn’t nice and funny?”  
  
“Fuck off,” Junhwe grumbles around a mouthful of pizza crust.  
  
“Let’s try this again,” Yunhyeong says, leaning over to nick the fallen pepperoni from the box. He pops it into his mouth as he continues, “How would you like to go on a date, all expenses paid.”  
  
Junhwe perks up considerably. “You mean... food?”  
  
“Anything you like,” Yunhyeong says, but before Junhwe can make wild suggestions about trips to Paris, Donghyuk (that bastard) adds, “Within reason, of course.”  
  
“Which sucker do you have in mind this time?”  
  
“Someone who thinks you’re hot,” Yunhyeong answers. The bastard _knows_ what Junhwe’s weak points are; this is why you should never let people get close to you.  
  
“It’s good to share the same opinions, yeah,” Junhwe agrees with a shrug. “But how does he know me?”  
  
“We may or may not have just sent your picture to him,” Donghyuk says, wiping his hand on a napkin to retrieve his phone. There’s a moment of silence, then Donghyuk’s holding up a series of messages, one of which contains Junhwe’s picture from that evening, looking disgruntled as he pores over his illegible class notes. The message after the picture reads: _date me instead?_  
  
“What the fuck,” Junhwe says, because he might not own a Twitter account (“The world doesn’t need to know what you want to say every few minutes, thanks.”), but he’s pretty damn sure these messages are going out to someone called “Bobby”, and if he’s _right_ about what he thinks is going on, then he’s going to be spending the rest of the year without a roommate. Or a best friend. “What the _fuck_.”  
  
“Before you get mad,” Donghyuk starts, snatching his phone back. He probably knows Junhwe’s about to take it and chuck it across the room. “He thinks you’re cute. And he’s willing to bring you out to a restaurant of your choice.”  
  
“Are you crazy? Is he crazy?” Junhwe questions, directing the second part of that question to Yunhyeong, who shrugs in a way that suggests that, like Donghyuk, he thinks it’s a good idea. “I’m the only sane one in this room, aren’t I? There’s _no way_ this is happening.”  
  
“You go on a date with him then,” Junhwe challenges, shovelling the rest of his pizza in his mouth. “This isn’t funny.”  
  
“It’s a harmless bit of fun,” Donghyuk insists, and fuck, he’s wearing that kicked puppy expression again. Junhwe _should_ be immune to it now, but it seems like Donghyuk’d only levelled up over the years. “If he’s for real, then you get to go on a date for the first time in _months_ —“  
  
“—hey!”  
  
“—and if he’s not serious about it... then _we’ll_ treat you. Right, Yunhyeong?” Donghyuk asks, to which Yunhyeong just nods. Suck up.  
  
“How desperate are you guys to use this room without me?” Junhwe questions, sitting firmly on his decision. This was a concoction for a bad night—Junhwe plus some person who announces his relationship to the world? No fucking way. Not even for a trip to Paris.  
  
“‘o ye of little faith,” Yunhyeong says. Donghyuk’s phone chimes loudly and they all turn to look at it in unison.  
  
“... what?” Junhwe asks, when Donghyuk nearly chokes on a pepperoni.  
  
“He asks if you’re too chicken to take him on,” Donghyuk replies, in a slow, measured tone. Yunhyeong snorts disbelievingly, leaning over to take a look at Donghyuk’s phone.  
  
“ _This_ is why he’s single now,” Junhwe says, although he won’t lie and say that his interest isn’t piqued.  
  
“Well...” Yunhyeong trails off, as if to suggest that Junhwe’s too chicken to take Bobby on. Which is a blatant misassumption and Junhwe is _offended_ that his roommate of almost two years would think such a thing of him. It’s not about whether he’s scared or not, it’s about whether he wants this or not.  
  
And he doesn’t. No way. He has better things to deal with in life, like doing the laundry before he has to start reusing the cleanest boxers he has again. Who the hell has time to amuse a questionable person who responds to random tweets on the internet? Junhwe (or Yunhyeong, in this case, since it’s Yunhyeong’s account, after all) could be a serial murderer or an obsessed fanatic and Bobby would be none the wiser. Considering that he _did_ take Yunhyeong seriously, then he really _is_ not too smart.  
  
“Gimme your phone,” Junhwe announces loudly, wiping his palms on his pants as he reaches over to snatch it before Donghyuk can protest.  
  
“Fuck. You,” Junhwe narrates aloud as he types, blatantly disregarding Donghyuk’s scandalized gasp. He has plans for this to be devastating. Forget breaking up with the love of his life or whoever she was, but mocking _Junhwe_ for not replying based on a badly taken picture of him by his idiot friends? Now _that_ was call for something life changing.  
  
But for some reason—and despite the logical side of his brain screaming at him not to do it—he ends up typing _Name a time and place and I’ll be there_.  
  
Shit.  
  
“What?” Donghyuk asks, dragging himself around the dingy coffee table to peer at Yunhyeong’s phone. “ _What_?”  
  
“What?” Yunhyeong echoes, and now Junhwe’s sandwiched between two morons and the biggest mistake of his life. Both Yunhyeong and Donghyuk exchange a look as Junhwe groans and drops the phone to the ground, dropping his head to the table.  
  
The sounds of his friends whooping loudly fills the room, and not for the first time, Junhwe regrets that he doesn’t have a brain-to-mouth filter that functions properly. This is almost as bad as the time he’d been sucker punched in grade school for mouthing off to a bully twice his size (since then Junhwe has grown considerably and has learnt to at least fake it enough to back up his claims). This, though. This he couldn’t get out of without looking like a complete imbecile.  
  
“Our Junhwe has a date!” Donghyuk declares, clearly deciding to add salt to the wound by half-piling on top of Junhwe into a hug. Then, of _course_ Yunhyeong has to jump in and turn it into an uncomfortable group hug of which Junhwe was at the very reluctant epicentre.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
Junhwe nearly forgets about the date until he catches Donghyuk’s passive-aggressive message (“Myeongdong at 6pm! I made sure to wash your nice jeans!”) scribbled on their shared calendar. In his defense, he’d been trying very hard not to drown in his assignments. But he’s also been trying very hard not to remember that his thumbs had operated out of their own will and landed him into a deal for a very uncomfortable night. Or day. Could dates last for one hour? Or half an hour? Who’s to say that it couldn’t be five minutes long, right?  
  
“He seems like a nice guy,” Donghyuk tries to assure him as Junhwe shoves his legs into his nice jeans. “I mean, musically, he’s good—“  
  
“Pass,” Junhwe calls loudly.  
  
“— _and_ our messages have been pleasant. He doesn’t know we’re not you, of course,” Donghyuk continues. A little too flippantly, in Junhwe’s opinion, just because he’s freshly showered and sitting cross-legged on his damn bed with Yunhyeong and dinner to look for to. The universe’s seriously unfair sometimes. “But he’s... nice.”  
  
“Thanks for the words of encouragement. Sorry, _word_ ,” Junhwe replies, considering if he should even bother combing his hair. He wanted to look like the epitome of reluctance. “And I’ll have you know, if you don’t pick up when I call, don’t bother keeping my contact in your phone.”  
  
“Don’t be like this,” Donghyuk whinges, and there he goes again. Junhwe’s going to kick something. Preferably Yunhyeong, when he returns. “You’re gonna have a good time! But you’re gonna jeopardize that if you start antagonizing him from the get go.”  
  
“Who, me? I’m getting a free meal and a movie out of this. Why would I antagonize him?” Junhwe returns sarcastically as he picks up his wallet and shoves it into his pants. “Don’t wait up for me. And _don’t_ touch my stuff. And my bed is strictly off-limits.”  
  
“We’re not going to—“ Donghyuk starts protesting, but Junhwe’s out of the room before he can finish the sentence.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
If Junhwe had wanted to look like the epitome of reluctance, then Bobby’d (that can’t be his real name, can it? Would it be too late for Junhwe to do a quick google on him now?) just one-upped him by turning up fifteen minutes late in a washed-out hoodie sporting a serious case of bed hair.  
  
_Great_ , Junhwe tries to tell himself, _this means we’re on the same page_. But he can’t feel a twinge of self-righteous anger anyway. Did someone of Junhwe’s stature and looks _not_ deserve at least combed hair? Was it because Junhwe’d been wearing his ratty old gym shorts in that picture?  
  
“Hey,” Bobby calls out, dropping his hooding and his headphones to his neck as he grins, “you’re Junhwe right?”  
  
“Yeah.” Junhwe forces a smile. Civility, he tries to remind himself, civility and politeness and this night’ll be over before he even notices it. “Bobby?”  
  
“Yeah, sorry. Studio had some difficulties after _someone_ tried to microwave aluminium foil.” Now that he’s said it, Junhwe can detect the smell of something singed on Bobby. It’s not a good first impression. “But I escaped with my eyebrows intact—“ Junhwe’s eyes flicker up questioningly as Bobby pulls back his unruly bangs “—so at least one thing’s going well for me this month.”  
  
“Huh,” Junhwe says, because nothing can easily express more disinterest than that word. Bobby seems to be able to take a hint, even though his ridiculous smile doesn’t leave his face.  
  
“Let’s go, the movie’s starting soon,” he says instead, and has the gall to actually _elbow_ Junhwe.  
  
There’s a reason why Junhwe’s agreed to his movie. The first being that people weren’t obliged to talk to each other for over two hours during a screening. The second being that if the movie was interesting enough, Junhwe was the kind of person that spoke through the entire thing, thereby earning him a spot in the Assholes Who Talk In Movies and Deserve That Special Level of Hell category. Dates usually didn’t call back.  
  
But because the universe apparently had something against him recently, his experience ends up the deadly combination of a movie being actually _interesting_ , and Bobby ends up being the kind of guy to end up straight in hell with him. They talk almost non-stop from the opening scene, so engrossed that the popcorn Junhwe’d intended to vacuum up laid forgotten and wedged between their chairs. So much so that he doesn’t even notice Bobby’s leaning in against him, pressed shoulder to elbow against Junhwe’s arm, and _laughing_ in his ear. He only notices their proximity when the credits start rolling and he’s suddenly face-to-face with his date.  
  
“If this were a movie,” Bobby starts, completely ruining the moment Junhwe would staunchly deny they were having, “we’d be kissing right now.”  
  
“Yeah, sure,” Junhwe snorts, quickly pulling away. He’s glad for the darkness of the theatre, glad that Bobby can’t see whatever facial expression he’s pulling now because he wants to leave this night behind with dignity. “Face it, we met on the internet. This isn’t a date.”  
  
“Oh yeah?” Bobby asks. There’s a hint of challenge in his voice that shouldn’t make Junhwe’s stomach do a funny, fluttering thing. He’s blaming Donghyuk for this. “Then what would you call it?”  
  
_A mistake_ , Junhwe wants to say, but he’s had an enjoyable enough night to have the capacity to be civil and nice and all that other stuff that didn’t end up with him being punched.  
  
“Look, my friends messaged you or tweeted you—or whatever it’s called—that photo and I didn’t want to show you up,” Junhwe says, because after two hours of intense discussion on why time travel shouldn’t be plausible, Bobby deserves at least a modicum of respect. “They were joking. Mostly. Well, more like they’re joking at _my_ expense, but they seem to like you well enough.” Bobby’s studying him like he’s just spotted an interesting specimen of frog he hasn’t quite seen before. Junhwe doesn’t like it one bit, but he soldiers on anyway. “So let’s just call this what this is—an accident.”  
  
There’s a beat of silence, and then Bobby says, “I’m pretty sure I can change your mind.”  
  
This time, it’s Junhwe’s turn to raise his eyebrow challengingly. “Brute force isn’t encouraged,” Junhwe says.  
  
“Who’s talking about brute force? By the end of tonight, you’ll be asking _me_ out for a second date.”  
  
Junhwe scoffs. Now _here’s_ the Bobby he’d expected. Cocksure and insufferably smug even when Junhwe could upend the entire bucket of popcorn over his head. But Junhwe’s never been one to back down from a challenge, let alone one that’s as easy as this. The way Junhwe sees it, he gets to go for a free meal with someone he doesn’t want to run out on. That’s a pretty sweet deal.  
  
“Okay,” Junhwe says, brushing the salt and popcorn kernel off his pants, “and if you don’t?”  
  
“Then I’ll write you into a song about _the one who got away_ ,” Bobby says with a grin that seems completely sincere, slinging on his messenger bag as he gets up.  
  
“I’m not supposed to be the one to get the punishment when _you_ lose,” Junhwe returns, but he can’t quite help smiling. He’s blaming it on the fact that Bobby’s face is infectious. “Just don’t mention my name.”  
  
“But where’s the fun in that?” Bobby asks, carelessly slinging an arm around Junhwe’s shoulders. Junhwe tenses immediately—he’s just not good with physical contact, okay, it’s 100% not because Bobby looks like he hasn’t washed in several days. To his credit, Bobby retracts his arm and ushers Junhwe down the steps and out the door.  
  
Junhwe starts realizing that he might actually end up losing the bet when Bobby drags him into one of those CD shops that still allow you to try out the albums before purchasing. It’s a little late, so there’s barely any customers in the shop, but Bobby had insisted on coming in (instead of getting food, like Junhwe’d intended, because he hadn’t actually ended up eating any of that popcorn) when Junhwe told him that he hadn’t listen to a single one of Bobby’s songs.  
  
“I can’t believe you. I _don’t_ believe you,” Bobby says, as he enthusiastically searches the shelves for his CD. It’s a little endearin— no, _wait_ , hold up. It’s _obnoxious_ to want someone to listen to your music. That’s like shoving your work into someone’s face and flat out demanding for compliments. Junhwe’s a pretty narcissistic guy, sure, but even _he_ has yet to stoop to that level. Yet. Then again, it’s not like he’s churning out work he’s particularly proud of. “Got it! C’mon, don’t stand there looking judgmental.”  
  
“I’m not looking like anything,” Junhwe protests, a little pointlessly, letting Bobby drag him along (and by drag, Bobby’s pinching the front of Junhwe’s jacket to lead him towards the testing stations). Then Bobby’s popping his CD in and thumbing through the walkman that looks like it fell straight out of the 90s, scrolling through his list of songs.  
  
“Usually, I want people to listen to this shit in order of the tracklist,” Bobby explains, glancing up to Junhwe like any of this made sense. Junhwe’s capabilities and explorations in music honestly extends only to singing in the shower, so it’s not like he can comment. Bobby seems enthusiastic, though, and if Junhwe’s being honest with himself—like the _uncomfortable_ sort of honest—then that’s enough for Junhwe to comply to whatever Bobby wants. Within reason. “But you look like a tough one, so... here—“  
  
Then he’s shoving an earbud in Junhwe’s direction, stuffing the other one in his ear as he grins up at Junhwe and— right, they’ve only met for a handful of hours, and Junhwe finds himself readily agreeing anyway. It’s just one night. He’s going to win the bet. He’s going to be able to get over tonight without—  
  
And then he hears the opening bars and Bobby’s voice and he finds himself struggling to keep his own face composed. It’s not like he’d expected Bobby to be complete shit, because his friends like Bobby, and he can at least trust his friends to have good taste in music even if their judgment of other people’s characters sometimes lacked sorely. But he hadn’t expected to find himself liking it, either.  
  
“It’s not bad,” Junhwe says, expecting Bobby to retort loudly (like he’d been doing _all fucking night_ ). “Passable.”  
  
“You like it?” Bobby says instead. Jesus, did his eyes have to light up like he just saw the second coming?  
  
“... yeah,” Junhwe says, unable to find it in himself to even pretend to be disagreeable. “It’s good. You’re good.”  
  
“I told you,” Bobby says, and then he’s back to that insufferable, smug person from the theatre. Junhwe wants to bash his head in with the walkman. Or kiss him. It’s a confusing duality of feelings, so he ends up shoving it to the back of his mind in favour of appreciating the song fully, bobbing his head to the tune of the music. He’s so absorbed that it takes him a few seconds to realize that Bobby’s belting out the godamn lyrics in the middle of the godamn store.  
  
“Are you always this embarrassing?” Junhwe asks, suppressing the urge to smile because shit, people are looking at them. Junhwe likes attention, but he doesn’t like it to come served up with a side of judgement. “We’re in _public_.”  
  
In response, Bobby only accompanies his singing with a little dancing, his shoulder jostling against Junhwe’s in the small space between both earbuds. Junhwe can’t help it—he laughs, mirroring Bobby’s actions in a way that’s only (and unfortunately) half-mocking.  
  
Junhwe ends up letting Bobby take him through the rest of Bobby’s tracks on the CD. He’s explaining why it took five months and a cat to produce the last song on his CD when two girls approach them, looking clearly apprehensive and out of their element.  
  
“So,” one of them starts and Bobby groans jokingly.  
  
“Really? I came out like this and you guys still recognize me?” he asks, but it’s obvious that he’s not irritated. Junhwe reluctantly removes his earpiece to watch the conversation unfold. “I mean, to be honest I haven’t combed my hair since this morning—“  
  
“—no, yeah, we heard you covering _Go_ ,” the second girl says, almost a little breathlessly. They’re fans, that much is obvious, but Junhwe, being the kind of guy that had never actively participated in this sort of exchange, isn’t sure if he’s more fascinated or wary. “Can you sign something for us?”  
  
“I don’t know, can you?” Bobby teases as he fishes around his pocket for a pen and _somehow_ manages to procure one from within the depths of his saggy jeans. “Who should I make it out to?”  
  
And then Junhwe has to stand there and endure ten minutes of arduous _but you’re so good! We love your stuff!_ and _Nah, really? Which track is your favourite? Number 5? Airplane? Why?_. Where was that humility when Junhwe was the one listening? Throughout the entire exchange, both girls constantly flick their eyes over to him, and it makes Junhwe feel slightly uncomfortable, to be associated with Bobby like this. He doesn’t want his face to be plastered all over social media accounts and those ten news sites Yunhyeong was talking about earlier when this is going to be a one-off thing.  
  
“He’s cute, right?” Bobby asks, snapping Junhwe out of his reverie to realize that all three of them are _looking_ at him.  
  
“What,” he says instinctually, crossing his arms.  
  
“I’m just asking them if they think I’ve got a shot for a second date.”  
  
Junhwe could honestly walk out. There’s nothing stopping him from just physically _leaving_. It’s not like Bobby’s Donghyuk, whose feelings he actually has to keep in mind, or anyone else he has to maintain an extended relationship with for that matter. But he doesn’t. Instead, he’s pretty sure his face heats up and he scoffs as both girls giggle behind their hands. They don’t seem to want to smack Junhwe with their freshly signed CDs, so _maybe_ he’s been watching one too many TV shows.  
  
“They probably think the world shines out of your ass,” Junhwe puts in later, when the two girls have gone on their merry way with their Bobby-endorsed memorabilia.  
  
“Great, you can take some pointers,” Bobby replies cheerily, pocketing his pen.  
  
“Is this even allowed?” Junhwe questions next, gesturing between the both of them. “Aren’t celebrities supposed to... to portray sort of unattainable image or something?”  
  
“Hey,” Bobby says, shrugging as he removes the CD and places it back into the casing carefully, “I’m just here to make music. Anything else they assume is their own problem.”  
  
“You’re pretty confident for a guy who’s _not_ gonna win this bet,” Junhwe says, patting Bobby’s back condescendingly.  
  
A look of surprise flits across Bobby’s face for a split second, and then he’s grinning again, leaning over to stage-whisper in Junhwe’s ear, “Lemme tell you a secret: you're wrong.”


	2. Chapter 2

Bobby doesn’t lose the bet, but he doesn’t exactly win it either. He ends up walking Junhwe to the bus-stop and asks if Junhwe wants to catch the blockbuster movie coming into the theatre next week. “It’s a romance movie,” Bobby says knowingly, attempting to waggle his eyebrows. Junhwe says _attempt_ because it looks more like his forehead has chosen to fold in on itself. It’s a good distraction from the fact that Bobby now knows that Junhwe’s preference of movie genres is romance. Which, going back to the idea that this is strictly a one-off thing, isn’t good at all. “My treat. I’ll drive you out of campus and everything.”  
  
“Okay,” Junhwe says, because why the hell not? He’s free next week. He might consider cajoling Donghyuk and Yunhyeong out provided that they don’t moon all over Bobby. There are, really, a plethora of reasons as to why he shouldn’t say no, and none of them has to do with the fact that Bobby’s starting to grow on him. Not at all.  
  
Bobby grins—Junhwe’s starting to realize that’s the grin that’s the Bobby equivalent of _holy shit really?_ —and snatches up Junhwe’s hand, using the pen from earlier to scribble a bunch of nearly illegible numbers on Junhwe’s palm, explaining what each number is for (“This is my office, if you can’t reach me on my cell. This one’s on my home phone, if you can’t reach the other two.”).  
  
“You have the handwriting of a fucking five year old,” Junhwe comments, once Bobby returns his hand to him. He squints at the slanted, pointed numbers, rotates his palm this way and that, then squints at Bobby questioningly, trying his hardest to ignore the way his hand’s fucking tingling in the wake of Bobby’s warmth. “I might as well start dialling numbers at random.”  
  
“Then just call me on my phone,” Bobby says, “I’ll pick up.” There’s a pause, then Bobby makes an aborted movement towards Junhwe and ends up patting Junhwe’s shoulder (which, Junhwe tells himself isn’t the slightest bit anti-climatic). “Call me!” And then, as if he can’t spend a second longer in Junhwe’s presence, he starts down the sidewalk with a jaunty wave.  
  
Junhwe tries to tell himself that it’s in bad taste for a date to leave without first seeing Junhwe on the bus. But the logical part of Junhwe’s mind—the part of his mind that _didn’t_ rise to the occasion when Junhwe’d been sitting sandwiched between Yunhyeong and Donghyuk and staring down that Twitter page—tells him that, no, he had a pretty good time, that he’d laughed and smiled more than he’d spent delivering looks of judgment. And even those looks of judgments had been accompanied with more laughing and smiling.  
  
Still, he spends his entire bus ride back to campus downloading Bobby’s songs and listening to them in turn.  
  
  


 

 

  
  
  
  
The first thing Junhwe regrets is telling Donghyuk about Date #2. In his defense, he’d been drained and exhausted and Donghyuk had used his Best Friend voice and Yunhyeong had used his I Bet Junhwe Was Ditched Halfway Through voice which all led to Junhwe blurting out, “I’m meeting him next week.”  
  
He doesn’t know if it reflects more on him or on them that they both make ecstatic sounds reminiscent of the first time his mother had seen an A on his report card.  
  
“Platonically,” Junhwe adds, rather uselessly, because not only were they no longer listening to him, but insisting that they were strictly friendly seems a little forced at this point.  
  
After all, Junhwe spends most of the rest of that week texting Bobby non-stop. He hadn’t intended for it to happen, at first, but then he’d been sitting in one of his compulsory history electives—and his professor seemed like she fell straight out of the 15th century, too—and Bobby had sent in the most hideous selfie Junhwe had ever had the misfortune to lay eyes on and he’d rather die than admit that he might’ve smiled. Just a little.  
  
The second thing Junhwe regrets, is texting in full view of his friends.  
  
“Why’s he smiling like that?” Suhyun asks, reaching over to whisper-that’s-not-a-whisper in Yunhyeong’s direction. Junhwe likes Suhyun enough—she’s sweet and sincere and funny, but he’s really going to commit unspeakable acts if Yunhyeong says something stupid.  
  
“He’s got a _boyfriend_ ,” Yunhyeong emphasizes, in the way that only Yunhyeong can. There it is. Junhwe’s motive for murder.  
  
“I don’t,” Junhwe says, but as the week pans out, he’s starting to realize that saying _I don’t_ is apparently the number one way to convince people that you do. “Must you guys announce this to _everyone_ you meet?”  
  
“Yup,” Yunhyeong replies cheerily, and Junhwe groans, sliding his phone into his pocket, vowing silently not to use it for the rest of the night. It’s not that it rubs him the wrong way, per se. Okay, it rubs him the wrong way. He doesn’t particularly like discussing his private life, and he certainly doesn’t like discussing anything that has to do with Bobby. It makes Junhwe feel like he’s talking and thinking more about Bobby than he’s really should be.  
  
“Don’t keep your phone,” Suhyun pleads. Her eyes fucking _gleam_ as she leans over the table (and across her godamn homework, which she should be working on instead of harassing Junhwe like this). “I never get to hear about people you like. What sort of person is he? Is he nice?”  
  
_Is he nice?_ Junhwe doesn’t quite know how to answer this question. Yunhyeong and Donghyuk had been all too ready to assume Bobby’s personality—a kind persona over his celebrity status. But it’s different from when you’re looking at the living, breathing person who can’t stop sending Junhwe pictures of his fucking supper in the middle of the godamn night despite Junhwe’s incessant complaints (“Want me to come over?” Bobby’d asked, and Junhwe had replied swiftly with a, “Try and you die.”). Junhwe doesn’t want to assume he knows Bobby; they’ve been texting for a grand total of four days. That’s hardly enough time to scratch the surface of a person, regardless of how many texts and phone calls they’d exchanged.  
  
“No,” Junhwe replies in the end, “he’s a smug bastard.”  
  
“That’s Junhwe talk for _yes I like him_ , isn’t it?” Suhyun asks with a wide grin as she turns to Yunhyeong. Why is everyone adamant on undermining everything Junhwe says? Is there something on his face that says _by all means, please disagree with me_?  
  
“I’ve known him for less than a week,” Junhwe points out. “Plenty of time for him to reveal that he’s a sociopathic murderer.”  
  
“Pessimist,” Suhyun accuses, but she’s _still_ smiling, as if Junhwe had done nothing but sing Bobby’s praises.  
  
“Realist,” Junhwe counters, forcibly ending the conversation by stuffing his earbuds in his ears.  
  
  
  


 

 

  
  
  
If it so happens that Junhwe tells Bobby to pop by and pick him up at a time Yunhyeong (and by extension, Donghyuk, since those two seem to be joined at the hip these days) isn’t in, then Junhwe can, with a mostly clear conscience, say that it’s a pure coincidence.  
  
Their second date ends up with them mapping the trail of any of the single dinner/supper pictures Bobby’d sent in the past week that Junhwe had commented with a variation of _I want that in my mouth_ (to which Bobby had opened his own mouth leerily and Junhwe had slapped his hand right across Bobby’s face). What surprises Junhwe is the meticulousness with which Bobby had noted the exact combination of food Junhwe wanted, most of which had came in the form of disgruntled comments like “I had that with cheese once, it’s good you lucky piece of shit”.  
  
In true Koo Junhwe tradition, he doesn’t outwardly demonstrate that he’s impressed because there’s really no need to inflate Bobby’s ego any more than it already is; he wants Bobby’s head to fit through his own car door. Nonetheless, he lets Bobby feed him and—he’s never going to admit this outside the small, enclosed space of Bobby’s car—he feeds Bobby in return as they talk about the songs on the radio and the width of space between the street lamps and the family who’s queueing in line ahead of them for the patbingsoo and how Bobby’s experiencing a terrible sort of artist block and Junhwe says he’s experiencing a writer’s block, too, only this one’s motivated by laziness.  
  
Junhwe’s not utterly dense—he knows where exactly this is headed, and he can’t say that he’s surprised at all. Even if everyone in the world keeps telling him he’s emotionally constipated, he damn well knows what he wants. It’s just telling everyone else what he wants that’s the problem, even if everyone seems keen to meddle in his life.  
  
Bobby, on the other hand, doesn’t push—he gives Junhwe the space he needs until Junhwe’s comfortable enough with the touching and the back patting and the absurd amount of times Bobby tries to tuck Junhwe to his side, despite the fact that they were both the same height so Junhwe has to imitate the Hunchback of Notredame.  
  
“Is your plan to feed me to my death?” Junhwe groans out after their fifth and last stop, trying not to throw up on all of Bobby’s upholstery. Bobby laughs, in response, and it’s kind of pathetic how Junhwe’s starting to like the sound. “‘cause I’m telling you, it’s working.”  
  
“You kept complaining I didn’t feed you enough the last time,” Bobby replies, starting up the car. How he’s capable of motion is beyond Junhwe, who feels like his stomach’d turned into lead. “So I’m just making sure you leave with satisfaction.”  
  
“By _killing_ me?” Junhwe questions, trying his hardest not to jostle any parts of him even in the slightest. An impossible feat in a moving car, of course, but it doesn’t mean he can’t _try_.  
  
“I like you too much to let you die,” Bobby says. Junhwe groans even louder to ignore the way the heat rushes up to his cheeks. He can’t believe his own reaction; he’s neither twelve nor is this his first date. “‘sides, I’m certified in CPR.”  
  
“If that’s a pick-up line, I’m throwing up on your dashboard,” Junhwe declares unceremoniously, to which Bobby reaches over to rub his back. It helps, just a little, mainly because Bobby’s the one doing it, but Junhwe decides to groan threateningly anyway, tipping his head back and closing his eyes. It’s the prolonged silence that causes him to blink and glance over, only to catch Bobby looking at him, mouth hanging slightly open. “... what?”  
  
“You’re cute,” Bobby says outrightly, revving up the engine and pulling out of the lot. “I mean, I swear when I saw that first picture with you and the gym shorts, I thought Hanbin was shitting me.”  
  
“Huh,” Junhwe says, firstly because opening his mouth puts him at a higher risk of throwing up, and secondly because he _doesn’t know what to say_.  
  
“He’s the one who replied, by the way, not me. He’d been going on what he called an _unfollowing spree_ and _throwing away the debris of my old life_ ,” Bobby talks as he drive. “He said _blonde in ratty old gym shorts, 150% your type just propositioned you, I’m gonna ask him out_. And then Jinhwan and Chanwoo both agreed with him. Said something about it being time to move the hell on.”  
  
“So the asshole who replied to Donghyuk wasn’t you,” Junhwe states, unsure if the pang in his chest is disappointment.  
  
“Nope.” Bobby glances over at Junhwe, giving him a once-over that Junhwe makes the heavy feeling in his chest dissipate almost at once. “But I’m gonna have to buy them a meal.”  
  
“Sucker,” Junhwe mutters, for a lack of anything to say. Bobby’s smooth, but Junhwe can’t help thinking that he’s probably like that to everyone else, anyway. It’s not a bad thing that Bobby’s disgustingly charming, it’s just that Junhwe doesn’t know what’s real and what’s a side-effect of his personality. “I knew you stuck around for my winning personality and not my thighs in those gym shorts.”  
  
“No, your thighs in those gym shorts are pretty damn winning too,” Bobby replies without missing a beat. “I _could_ always just double-check again. The quality of that picture was pretty shitty. Plus, nothing can beat the real deal.”  
  
Junhwe’s about to retort that he doesn’t put out until the third date when Bobby’s phone rings. It’s Jinhwan who’s calling to tell Bobby that they just survived a power trip in their building (“Are your friends always this dramatic?” Junhwe questions) but the file Hanbin had been working on for the whole day, unfortunately, did not.  
  
“The good news,” Bobby relays once he hangs up the phone, a little furrow appearing between his eyebrows, “is that Hanbin hasn’t burnt down the whole building, or tried to run away. Yet.”  
  
“He sounds fun,” Junhwe comments dryly, but reaches over to pat Bobby’s shoulder a little awkwardly by way of comfort. Bobby glances up at him, looking like he’s surprised Junhwe’s touching him at all—Junhwe should _probably_ feel offended—but he ends up taking Junhwe’s hand in his, carefully, slowly, like he thinks Junhwe might pull away. Which, okay, Junhwe can’t pretend that he hasn’t given Bobby reason to, so he folds his fingers over Bobby’s hand and squeezes his hand lightly. “You can drop me back at campus.”  
  
“I was thinking you should come along.”  
  
“Into the shitstorm?” Junhwe asks, raising an eyebrow. But Bobby’s holding his hand—seriously, Junhwe’s going to have to reflect on how much Bobby’s reducing his emotional maturity into one of a twelve year old’s—and he’d technically cleared out his schedule for today, so really, he has no reason to disagree.  
  
“It’s not _that_ bad,” Bobby says cajolingly. He plays with Junhwe’s hand as he drives, and Junhwe tries to concentrate on being very full of food instead of being very full of an unidentified fluttery feeling. “You’d like Jinhwan. Chanwoo’s not gonna say much, at first. And if I can calm Hanbin down, he’d be dying to meet you.”  
  
“I’m not sure either one of those options sound like something I want or would ever need in my life,” Junhwe replies, snorting. Trust Bobby to adopt the strangest set of friends. “But okay. I need to meet these mythical people who claim they like you.”  
  
“There’s one in this car right now,” Bobby says, grinning almost salaciously at Junhwe. Junhwe resists the urge to roll his eyes and mostly fail.  
  
“You can’t _like_ yourself, it doesn’t count.” And then Bobby’s pouting at him, god-to-honestly sticking his lips out like he’s a grade-schooler who couldn’t get his way. Junhwe tries his damndest not to find that endearing. (Spoiler: he also mostly fails.) “You’re the worst.”  
  


 

 

  
  
  
  
  
Surprisingly, Junhwe does like them. Well, not Hanbin—he seems a little hysterical for Junhwe’s tastes. Granted, he had just lost hours of his work in an instant, and lord knows what path of destruction Junhwe would’ve laid had the same fate befall his school work. Chanwoo is, when Junhwe meets him later, too quiet and gone too fast for Junhwe to suss out, but quiet’s a good thing. Quiet beats accosting Bobby the moment he enters the door (unfortunately, this includes the act of letting go of Junhwe’s hand) and speaking to him in increasingly loud whispers.  
  
“Don’t mind them,” the only other occupant of the room says, pulling down his headphones in favour of standing up. “You’re Junhwe, right? I’m Kim Jinhwan, Bobby’s friend.” He offers up a hand to shake—the guy’s small, unthreatening, and doesn’t seem like he’s about to play 20 questions with Junhwe—so Junhwe takes it.  
  
“Yeah,” Junhwe replies, glancing curiously around the studio. It’s a small space, clearly comfortable enough to house four of them without it being too cramped. It isn’t anything like Junhwe’d envisioned, not that he’s been thinking much about it, but he’d expected it to be slightly less cluttered for some reason. Then again, Bobby had turned up on their first sort-of date mostly under-dressed and smelling like smoke because someone had microwaved aluminium foil. Jinhwan suddenly didn’t seem all too innocuous. “Bobby said it’d be alright if I came over.”  
  
“’s fine, this isn’t the first time this happened,” Jinhwan says with a grin. He seems pretty chill for a guy whose friends are currently having a very heated whispering session, with Hanbin looking increasingly stressed. “The building’s kinda shitty, and I’m shitty with computers too. Sorry for interrupting your date.”  
  
“Not a date,” Junhwe says automatically, then recalls that this is a complete stranger who knows Bobby and has nothing against Junhwe. He quickly backpedals. “I _mean_ , it’s okay, we were in his car anyway.”  
  
“Oh yeah! The food trail and then the movie, right?” Jinhwan nods knowingly, as if Bobby had mapped out every detail of their day together with him. Which, perhaps he did. Who knows? Maybe they had some sort of freaky co-dependent relationship, and Junhwe should run before he invested too much feelings in this. “The movie’s good, you know. I caught it last week.”  
  
“Yeah? Not with Bobby?”  
  
“First of all, I spend way, way, _way_ too much time with Bobby,” Jinhwan says, though his tone’s more joking than anything else. “Secondly, it’s not really his type of movie. He’s more of a gunshots and cars flipping kinda guy.” He gives Junhwe a pointed look and, okay, so maybe he’s not going to play 20 questions, but this conversation is clearly steering into territory Junhwe would prefer to stay out of.  
  
“We caught that last week. I guess it’s a kinda trade-off,” Junhwe says with a hint of finality because he senses The Talk looming in the distance and there’s no way in hell he’s sitting on one of _those_ when they’ve only gone out on two separate occasions. Also, feelings. Junhwe’s not too good with those, especially not with a stranger. “So what exactly do you do here? Bobby sings and raps and Hanbin...” Junhwe wracks his memory for anything to do with Hanbin that wasn’t a lesson in stupidity. “... composes?”  
  
“Mostly, yeah. They co-compose a lot. I help them out with song guides, sometimes, because you see—“ and then Jinhwan’s _leaning forward_ and an avalanche of musical jargon descends upon Junhwe. Well, he’s _assuming_ they’re musical jargons—he has no fucking clue what _syncopation_ is nor is he too interested in finding out. Whatever it is, the guy seems excited, and if he’s talking, it means Junhwe can just tune him out and nod accordingly whilst discreetly glancing over at Bobby’s direction.  
  
“Sorry, I must be boring you,” Jinhwan suddenly says, looking amused. Junhwe feels like he’s been caught with his hand in the cookie jar. “Occupational hazard: you bore everyone else who’s not in the industry to tears.”  
  
“I wasn’t bore—“ As if on cue, Junhwe yawns, cover his mouth with the back of his hand. “Okay, it was confusing. I was listening, I swear.”  
  
“Sure,” Jinhwan says. He doesn’t push it any further, and he doesn’t ask about Bobby either. Instead, they go back to talking about the movie Junhwe’d meant to watch with Bobby and Junhwe discovers that he and Jinhwan have a lot in common by way of musical and movie interests. He doesn’t even notice how far the conversation has gone until he finds himself asking, “Are you free next week? I can pencil you in on Thursday.”  
  
“You can _pencil me in_?” Jinhwan questions in amusement. “Okay, but _only_ if you have time, I don’t wanna disrupt your obviously busy week.”  
  
“Yeah, _obviously_ ,” Junhwe agrees, a little smugly, “but I’ll find a two-hour window to convince you why Memento’s not a load of crap.”  
  
“You’re on,” Jinhwan confirms, reaching over to exchange a hi-five with Junhwe.  
  
“Seriously? I had to grovel for _hours_ before you even agreed to go out with me,” Bobby interrupts out of nowhere, but he doesn’t look displeased. The opposite, in fact, if the grin on his face is anything to go by; he looks like he’d just facilitated the moon landing.  
  
“You didn’t _grovel_ ,” Junhwe disagrees, glancing around Bobby to see that Hanbin’s no longer there. Small mercies. “I’d have enjoyed myself more if you were.”  
  
“Fuck you.” But then he’s tugging at Junhwe’s arm, coaxing him to stand. “C’mon, I didn’t bring you here so you could fraternize with Jinhwan.”  
  
“Hey,” Jinhwan says, warningly, but that kinda thing doesn’t hold much weight when all people can see is the top of your head. If this had been another time or place, Junhwe would’ve done this entire conversation with Jinhwan a _little_ differently. But as it is, Bobby’s palm’s sliding down his arm and then he’s gripping onto Junhwe’s hand again. _Oh_. “Fine, discredit me like that. Just don’t come to me when you need help.”  
  
Bobby whines. Both Jinhwan and Junhwe rolling their eyes in unison.  
  
“This is a bad idea,” Bobby says, as he starts pulling Junhwe swiftly away. “I shouldn’ve introduced you when I haven’t conditioned him to hang onto my every word yet. Abort mission.”  
  
“ _What_ ,” Junhwe demands, letting himself be manhandled anyway.  
  
“It’s gonna happen sooner or later,” Bobby tells him sagely, as Jinhwan says, “You know this studio’s not _that_ big, right? I can see whatever you’re gonna do right from this couch, right? And Chanwoo’s returning soon from the superintendent’s office, you know that, _right_?”  
  
“We’ll see,” Bobby practically yells at Jinhwan.  
  
“Nothing, he means nothing!” Junhwe yells as well, because while Bobby’s open to besmirching his reputation like this, Junhwe’s a good and moral, upstanding citizen of society.  
  
“This is our recording room,” Bobby says, pushing open a heavy door to let Junhwe in. “For the record, or— _not_ for the record, it’s completely sound proof.”  
  
“So a murder room.” Junhwe grins as Bobby laughs and takes both his hands to drag him to the microphone stand.  
  
“Of course _you_ would think that,” Bobby snorts. “Wanna try recording a few lines?”  
  
“Who, _me_?”  
  
“Is there anyone else in this room I’m not aware of?”  
  
“I thought you thought there was someone else in the room, because there’s no way in _hell_ I’m doing that.”  
  
“Aw, c’mon, let me do my date thing. This is supposed to be romantic, y’know,” Bobby cajoles, swinging Junhwe’s hands. “Kinda like that pottery scene in the Ghost, but with a microphone.”  
  
There’s a beat of silence, and then Junhwe bursts out laughing because that imagery’s kind of ruined by its blatant euphemism for a handjob. “You’re not hearing yourself, are you?”  
  
It takes Bobby a few more seconds to get it, but then he’s pouting again and, okay, Junhwe’s starting to realize that this is his achilles heel. That he _has_ an achilles heel when it comes to Bobby. Shit.  
  
“Don’t turn this innocent room dirty,” Bobby protests, dropping Junhwe’s hands so he can clap both his hands together in a pleading manner. “Just one song, please?”  
  
“Did you fix your file?” Junhwe asks, trying to stall, but Bobby’s still making that face and Junhwe can feel it in his bones that he’s a second away from whinging. “Okay, jesus, just one.”  
  
One song turns into two songs, and then three songs, and then into some kind of noraebang session except with better quality audio and that Bobby isn’t the tone-deaf Yunhyeong nor Junhwe’s own sister, who seemed to have a thing for clutching her microphone and looking at the ceiling when she sings. The mysterious Chanwoo figure returns (and this is why Junhwe says they don’t get to talk much) but Junhwe and Bobby barely notice Jinhwan immediately latching onto him and leaving the recording studio entirely.  
  
When their throats are sore from going too hard at a rendition of _I Will Survive_ , Bobby leads Junhwe back out again and retrieves several bottles of beer from the mini-fridge under the editing console.  
  
“I wanna show you someplace,” Bobby tells him. _Someplace_ ends up with them sitting side by side in the stairwell of the highest floor, the window overlooking the roof cracked slightly open so it’s actually chilly rather than stuffy. They drink mostly in silence; Junhwe’s not much of a drinking person—he just never managed to pick up that habit what with his best friend being the World’s Biggest Nerd and adopting a social circle that preferred to study than to go out drinking—but the cool liquid’s a balm for his raw throat.  
  
“So,” Junhwe starts, breaking the comfortable silence. He’s going to blame the alcohol for what he says next, but in truth, he’s been itching with curiousity ever since they first started texting. “Did you dump her or did she dump you?”  
  
“Wow.” Bobby laughs, a little self-deprecatingly, a little in bewilderment, but mostly in amusement. He leans even more against Junhwe, knocking his beer bottle against his free palm. “You really don’t beat about the bush, huh?”  
  
“That takes effort and time that I don’t have,” Junhwe answers. For a long moment, he doesn’t think Bobby’s going to reply and he’s going over all the apology options and the _why don’t I tell you about the time I nearly scalped myself instead?_ options when Bobby takes a long swig and starts talking.  
  
“I met her in one of those music show events, right, back when I was starting out,” Bobby says. “We got along really well, and I mean _really well_.” Junhwe doesn’t bother commenting that it seems like Bobby gets along really well with just about anyone—from his fans to the restaurant owners and waiters and waitresses and even a stray little boy who’d gotten lost from his family this afternoon. “We went from 0 to 100 really quickly. But then, my career went from 0 to... well, let’s say 80 really quickly too. All within a span of a few months. And she said—“ Bobby pauses to air quote, his voice raising up a notch “— _I don’t wanna be seen as_ Bobby’s _girlfriend_. I mean, man, she pulled the whole _it’s not you it’s me_ thing.” He drags his hand down his face, and all of a sudden, Junhwe wants nothing more than to put his arm around Bobby and tell him that he’ll shove a beer bottle down the throats of anyone who incites whatever Bobby’s feeling right now again.  
  
They lapse into silence again. Junhwe starts regretting ever asking this in the first place—he’s not good with dealing with his own feelings, let alone other people’s. Which is probably why he ends up blurting out, “I told my ex to get his life together when he dumped me,” causing Bobby to choke mid-swallow, spitting beer _everywhere_. “Gross.”  
  
“You can’t drop that kinda shit on a guy when he’s trying to drink and wallow in his sorrow,” Bobby complains, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand.  
  
“I’m just trying to level out your sad break-up with my ridiculous one,” Junhwe reasons, reaching up to swipe at a bit of beer that Bobby didn’t manage to catch and then he freezes because Bobby tenses, staring at Junhwe like he’s expecting something to happen. The stairwell’s silence suddenly fills up with the sound of Junhwe’s heart thudding loudly in his ears. This is it, the pinnacle romance cliches that Junhwe’d watched a million times over and never quite got to experience for himself. This is—  
  
“Kim Bobby, when are you gonna get your ass back down? The superintendent wants to lock the building down for tonight to fix the thing with the power trip,” Hanbin’s voice—that unmistakably thin voice that runs like a knife through Junhwe’s limited patience—rings from somewhere below them. And then the spell breaks and Bobby’s back to looking like he recently spat beer all over his own face.  
  
“Yeah,” Bobby shouts in return. He sniffs, standing up first. There’s a moment where he looks like he’s going to stoop down and continue what his friend had just rudely interrupted. But then there’s also a moment where Bobby looks like he wants to apologize. He doesn’t do either one of those things. Instead, he says, “C’mon. You don’t wanna get locked in for the night.”


	3. Chapter 3

“So you _didn’t_ kiss him,” Donghyuk clarifies for the _n_ th time. Junhwe’s starting to feel like Donghyuk’s only repeating it to reiterate how stupid Junhwe had been for not seizing the chance.  
  
“Even though your faces were, like, 5 centimentres apart?” Suhyun persists. They’ve been spending too much time together. Junhwe needs to start intervening or Suhyun’s going to transform into Yunhyeong 2.0—Junhwe will be forced to drop his degree and change schools if it ever came to that.  
  
“And even though he’d been trying to _romance you all night_ ,” Donghyuk adds. Is he slowly leaning closer or is that just Junhwe’s imagination?  
  
“So?” Junhwe asks, flipping a page of his textbook with particular viciousness. “What’s your point? And do you have to use that fucking word?”  
  
“ _Yes_ ,” Donghyuk says, obviously just to be annoying. The two of them exchange exasperated looks.  
  
“See, this is why I hate studying with you guys. When are you gonna pay more attention to your textbook and less to me?” Junhwe bristles, making a face as he slides deeper into his chair in an attempt to ignore them both.  
  
“We’re concerned,” Suhyun says instead, probably thinking that Junhwe can’t see right through her sweet-as-saccharine voice. But then what she says is, “Is this Bobby guy not treating you well? You don’t have to go out with him if you don’t like him, you know. Right, Donghyuk?”  
  
“... yeah,” Donghyuk concedes, looking surprised at himself. Junhwe allows for a twinge of guilt at allowing Donghyuk to think that because he’s evaluated and re-evaluated his feelings for Bobby and come to the slightly alarming conclusion that yeah, some sort of feelings are definitely present. Maybe more than just _some sort_. Maybe Junhwe knows exactly what he wants from Bobby since the time he rapped in a falsetto in his recording studio. “I mean, I didn’t think that you wouldn’t _not_ like him. The second date happened and you—“  
  
“Don’t sweat it,” Junhwe interrupts, before Donghyuk can go off on a tangent and possibly attempt to draw some sort of pros and cons list. The thing is, Donghyuk’s good at navigating the uncharted waters of his own life (the bastard’s probably got the next ten years mapped out), but that didn’t necessarily mean that he knew how Junhwe wanted his own life to go. That, and Junhwe’s just shit at planning anything further than keeping his GPA afloat. “If it happens, it happens.”  
  
Junhwe doesn’t believe that for a single second, but it does seem to put Donghyuk and Suhyun at ease, and them not trying to constantly question Junhwe puts _him_ at ease. Besides, he’s the kind of guy to wallow in self-pity in silence. No need for Donghyuk to constantly throw looks of sympathy at him. The last time Junhwe had broken up with someone, Donghyuk had made a god-to-honest care package. It’d consisted of copious amounts of chocolate (so Junhwe can’t complain) but also copious amounts of Donghyuk-esque motivational quotes (so Junhwe _does_ complain). The last thing Junhwe needed was another one of those.  
  
What Junhwe really wanted instead was a clear signal from Bobby. A text declaring his affections would be the best, but realistically speaking, he’s okay with anything that was slightly above hand-holding and somewhere below actively sucking face. The fact that Bobby had pulled away in the stairwell was a clear enough signal. It’s just not the kind that Junhwe’s looking for.  
  
Whatever, Junhwe shouldn’t even be expending time and effort into thinking about this, let alone fret about what’s going to happen next. Rather than _if it happens, it happens_ , Junhwe thinks, it doesn’t matter if it happens or not. He’s got this. It’s fine.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
He’s passed out over his laptop when his phone vibrate from somewhere under his ribs, shaking him awake. Without even bothering to check who’s calling—because who else can it be but an asshole that calls when Junhwe’s asleep?—he picks up the phone and barks an irritated, “What?” into the speaker.  
  
“ _Oh_ ,” comes Bobby’s voice, low and slightly amused, “ _are you asleep?_ ” This isn’t the first time Bobby has called in the middle of the godamn night. At least, enough times for him to register the knowledge of what Junhwe sounds like when he’s been dragged awake from slumber.  
  
“Obviously fucking not,” Junhwe snipes, groaning as he rolls over onto his back. The clock on Yunhyeong’s bedside table tells him it’s 11pm, but his room’s still empty.  
  
“ _I can call back tomorrow morning?_ ” Bobby says. He doesn’t sound the slightest bit remorseful, but he does sound slightly anxious and tired and if Junhwe hadn’t just woken up, he’d probably be a little more concerned than he is now.  
  
“Just,” Junhwe says, rubbing his face as he yawns, “spit it out. What do you want?”  
  
“ _No, I—_ “ there’s a short pause, a shuffle, and then he hears Bobby sighing “— _haven’t seen you in a while_.”  
  
“We literally saw each other four days ago,” Junhwe points out, ignoring the warmth swelling his chest because in Junhwe’s book, that’s kinda uncool.  
  
“ _Yeah, that’s... that’s— hold on let me just, mmm— that’s 96 hours since I last saw your face_.”  
  
“And it’s been 20 hours since I last slept,” Junhwe counters, if only to keep himself from saying something stupid in return.  
  
Bobby doesn’t take bait, though. He doesn’t come back with his expected snipe or some sort of ridiculously cheesy comment that seriously makes Junhwe question his own taste in men. Instead, he asks, “ _Is there anything you wanna tell me?_ ”  
  
Junhwe snorts. Typical. Of course Bobby must be bored out of his mind in the studio, stuck on a verse or a bar in his music that he can’t bridge. Whatever it is, Junhwe’s not going to be tricked into saying something cheesy. He doesn't have the mental capacity to lie to himself in this drowsy state, so he can freely admit that it's been surprisingly difficult  _not_ to reciprocate the shit that freely spewed out of Bobby. But Junhwe has nothing but self-control.  
  
“Yeah: goodnight,” Junhwe says, shifting his laptop out of the way so he can lie down properly in bed, adjusting the phone in his hand. “It’s nearly midnight. Haul your ass home.”  
  
“ _Who says I’m not home?_ ”  
  
“You usually only call me when you’re stuck in the studio by yourself.”  
  
“ _That’s a lie, I call you under lots of other circumstances. That time I was constipate—_ “  
  
“Fuck you,” Junhwe cuts in, but he laughs anyway, a sort of fondness setting his chest aglow. It strikes him with sudden clarity that he wants Bobby here. He wants Bobby pressed up next to him, making some stupid ass comment about Junhwe’s paper, probably. Bobby’s always got a dumb comment lurking in him. He wants Bobby to hold his fucking hand. “So? What’s up? Are you in some sort of hostage situation?”  
  
“ _Fuck no. And even if I were, would I call you?_ ”  
  
“Point. But we should make up a code anyway.”  
  
“ _For a hostage situation?_ ” Bobby sounds incredulous. “ _Okay, alright, what about_ the eagle has been trapped.”  
  
“What the hell’s that?” Junhwe snorts, turning his head to half-bury his face in his pillow so his voice is muffled the next time he speaks. “It has to sound at least inconspicuous. Did you even try?”  
  
“ _You come up with it then_ ,” Bobby complains.  
  
“I’d just let them take you,” Junhwe says, trying to sound as sincere as possible. And then Bobby’s laughing and Junhwe’s chest is doing a weird thing that makes him wonder how Yunhyeong would feel if he returned to find Junhwe dead in his bed. “Less bother. More sleep.”  
  
“ _That’s mean. You like me. You—_ “ Bobby stops there and sighs. Junhwe feels nervous, for some reason. “ _Are you_ sure _you have nothing to tell me? Anything at all?_ ”  
  
“What?” Junhwe asks, because all of a sudden the conversation feels serious. “What do I have to tell you? We’re still on for next week, right? Cause I’m rushing this paper as fast as I can and let me tell you, this is no walk in the park. This is a walk through ten levels of hell and _then_ some.”  
  
“... _yeah, we are_ ,” Bobby concludes. He sounds dismal and disappointed and Junhwe can’t help but feel like he missed a very important point, somehow. “ _Same place as the first time?_ ”  
  
“As long as it’s not exactly like the first time. I don’t plan on waiting.” There’s another heavy pause, so Junhwe forces himself to speak. “Just. Don’t work too hard. Sleep. Uh, remember to drink... 8 glasses of water? Yeah that.”  
  
Bobby chuckles, but it’s a self-deprecating sound that, if Junhwe wasn’t still so out of it, would send alarm bells ringing in his head.  
  
“ _That’s rich, coming from you. Go back to sleep_.”  
  
“You don’t have to tell me twice.”  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
Their third date feels more like a series of missed opportunities. Junhwe certainly doesn’t notice that Bobby doesn’t take his hand. Nor does he notice that Bobby’s mostly quiet throughout the movie. And he certainly isn’t going to mention the fact that Bobby hasn’t spent the last twenty minutes post-movie from the theatre talking his ear off.  
  
“Did something happen?” Junhwe blurts out when they’re standing the queue to get into the restaurant. Bobby looks surprised at the question but he laughs, in that deflecting manner that Junhwe’d only seen when he unearthed a year old personalized CD from the depths of Bobby’s glove compartment. “You’re not sick, are you?” Junhwe slaps a hand over Bobby’s cheek and, nope, aside from the hot outdoors atmosphere turning him warm, he isn’t running a temperature at all. “Did Hanbin do something again?”  
  
“No and no,” Bobby replies, tugging Junhwe’s wrist away but drops it almost immediately, tucking his hand in his pocket. “I’m fine. Look at my face. Do I not look fine?”  
  
“You look like you haven’t had a bowel movement in three days,” Junhwe returns. “So you tell me.”  
  
“It’s...” Bobby’s floundering, eyes darting somewhere beyond Junhwe’s head. “Deadline’s next week but I’m stuck on this same bar that not even Hanbin on redbull can save.” Junhwe feels, selfishly enough, relieved. So it’s _not_ on him. It’s not his problem. Well, it kind of is his problem, now, because Bobby’s distracted and fidgety and kind of spacey and Junhwe wants to do _something_ that can at least alleviate his worries.  
  
“That’s easy,” Junhwe says, looking longingly at the remaining two parties ahead of them in the queue and making a snap decision. “C’mon.” He tugs Bobby out of the queue and sets down the street.  
  
“What? Wait— what about dinner? I _just_ left the studio,” Bobby complains, sounding more of himself than he had been the entire night. “It’s not gonna work if I just sit there and stare.”  
  
“And I’m definitely not gonna sit through dinner with you worrying about your work,” Junhwe says, turning a left once they’ve reached the end of the street. “We can buy takeaway.”  
  
“So you’re saying...” Bobby begins slowly, letting Junhwe drag him down the street. “... that you want to help me.”  
  
“I’m not sure you know how detrimental my help would be,” Junhwe says, coming to a stop in front of the first fast food store he sees. “More watching than helping, maybe.”  
  
“So you want to _watch me_ ,” Bobby corrects, making a stupidly leery expression. Junhwe rolls his eyes.  
  
“Watch you suffer? Yeah, that's 150% guaranteed to be better than any other kind of dinner time entertainment.”  
  
They end up getting enough takeout to feed them both twice over. Bobby argues in favour of dessert, but Junhwe counter-argues by saying that he’d like to be able to get up and bodily leave Bobby’s studio some time within the course of the night. Junhwe waits for Bobby to make some far-fetched, cheesy comment. Something along the lines of _but I’ll carry you out_ or _you can sleep with me_ that he’s learnt is part and parcel of the Kim Bobby Dating Program but it never quite comes. He firmly tells himself he’s not disappointed.  
  
Junhwe ends up mildly regretting this whole endeavour when they finally make it back and Bobby opens his editing program and bars upon colourful bars of sound waves pop up on his screen. There are approximately half a million buttons on the screen, and another half a million on the board next to Bobby’s keyboard.  
  
“Okay, so,” Bobby starts, but Junhwe cuts in with a, “Wait, why’re you teaching me? I don’t need to know this shit. I’m just here for moral support and fried chicken.”  
  
“Has anyone ever told you you provide shit moral support?” Bobby asks, looking at Junhwe with that mixture of exasperation and fondness (Junhwe thinks? hopes?) that he’s starting to get used to. “Because you provide shit moral support.”  
  
“Okay, I can take my chicken up into the stairwell,” Junhwe half-jokes, pretending to pack up.  
  
“Don’t,” Bobby immediately says, circling his fingers around Junhwe’s wrist. “Just listen to me talk. And pretend you’re interested, at least.”  
  
“The one thing I’m good at,” Junhwe concedes, sliding his chair closer to Bobby’s. “Okay, shoot.”  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
He’s embarrassed to say that he wakes up several hours later with a piece of chicken still in his mouth, stiff and absolutely foul tasting, with no recollection of how far Bobby had progressed with his music. He chews and swallows, blinking blearily as he comes to the realization that Bobby’s pacing in the recording room instead of sitting next to him. He’s on the phone, Junhwe notes blearily, and his conversation’s coming in tinny, but loudly on the headphones he’d left on his desk.  
  
Junhwe doesn’t mean to eavesdrop, but it’s _right there_ and it’s not like he can leave the room to avoid hearing it. Besides, Bobby’s too absorbed in his conversation to notice that Junhwe’s awake.  
  
“ _... haven’t told him yet_ —“ Bobby starts, and then he pauses, mumbling something indistinctly. “ _You can’t just bring it up like that. I still wanna be friends._ ” Another pause. Junhwe can see Bobby dragging his hand through his hair in the way that denoted frustration. “ _I know. It’s bad if I keep dragging it on. I just— what the hell are you supposed to say? Sorry I keep taking you on dates but this is weird?_ ” On hindsight, he _should’ve_ probably tried to leave, because he’s pretty sure Bobby’s talking about him. “ _No, he’s asleep now._ ” Definitely talking about Junhwe. He wonders if he can leave and not have Bobby notice. “ _I’ll try— no, honestly I would! Have a little faith in me, asshole_.”  
  
It’s a good thing that Bobby doesn’t immediately come out of the recording room, because Junhwe doesn’t know how to react. Okay, so Bobby wants to reject him, which would account for a lot of the shit that’d gone down that night. _Okay_ , Junhwe tells himself again. This isn’t a big deal. Junhwe once fell out with his best friend in middle school over a sandwich and three dollars. They have not spoken since, and he'd known that guy for _three years_. This is peanuts. This is nothing. At least Bobby has the decency to plan to let Junhwe down easily, right?  
  
And then Junhwe notices that he has Bobby’s jacket draped around his shoulders and he groans loudly. Who is he trying to kid? This sucks. This sucks and he shouldn’t have stupidly pinned any kind of expectations onto this at all. What was it that his grandfather used to say? Expectation is the root of all fuck ups? Something like that, anyway. He groans again, because he can, stubbornly shoving the jacket onto the table.  
  
“You’re up,” Bobby’s voice rings from behind him. Junhwe squints at him, wishing with all his might that he could just be in bed with a plate of Yunhyeong’s cheese fried rice and maybe whatever liquor he can convince Donghyuk to purchase. “Slept well? I worked hard while you were supposed to be helping me, by the way.”  
  
“Not helping,” Junhwe corrects, for lack of something better to say, “watching.”  
  
“Yeah, your eyes kinda have to be open for that,” Bobby points out, slipping back into his own seat. Bastard doesn’t look like he’s just recently discussed jilting Junhwe with someone else. He’s even _smiling_. Junhwe needs more than Yunhyeong’s cheese fried rice and beer. Junhwe needs a week long vacation where he doesn’t have to interact with anyone.  
  
“Suck it up,” Junhwe mumbles, rubbing his eyes. “What time is it?”  
  
“A little past midnight,” Bobby admits, glancing at the clock in the corner of his computer screen. “I didn’t wake you up because I didn’t wanna get punched.”  
  
“I don’t punch people, just ask Yunhyeong.” To clarify, Junhwe’s referring to punches that land. Random swings in the air don’t count, even if they’re intended to hurt. “Might make a special case for you, though.”  
  
And then Bobby’s laughing and where it would’ve made Junhwe’s insides warm just a few hours ago just made him feel incredibly silly, for some reason. Something must show on his face, because then Bobby’s putting on his best I’m Concerned expression, sliding his chair uncomfortably closer.  
  
“C’mon, I’ll drive you home. You’ve got Econs in the morning, right?” Of course the asshole remembers. Junhwe grunts noncommittally, making a show of shoving his chair backwards and stretching. He pretends he doesn’t notice Bobby’s eyes sweep over him slowly. He pretends that he’s not even bothering to pretend, because he _shouldn’t_.  
  
“Wanna come sit in class with me?” Junhwe offers jokingly, to fill in the silence. He watches as Bobby starts cleaning up all the boxes of chicken to trash.  
  
“There’s a reason I’m not in school,” Bobby points out with an exaggerated shudder. “8am classes? I’d rather be dead.”  
  
“Hey,” Junhwe says warningly, but it’s not like he’s not a zombie in the morning. Typically, he’d spend that morning oscillating between trying not to fall asleep and texting Bobby until Bobby wakes up (which is probably how Bobby remembers Junhwe’s timetable), but that option seems a little off-limits now. “Don’t fucking gloat when you’ve got a deadline to meet.”  
  
“Surprisingly,” Bobby says as they move towards the door, switching everything off in his path, “I managed to fix it when you were being completely useless.”  
  
“Not _helping_ ,” Junhwe reiterates again, if just for routine, “I’m just here to watch.”  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
The disappointment sits uncomfortably heavy in Junhwe’s chest all throughout the following Thursday. Junhwe’s good at compartmentalizing it, though, good at pretending shit didn’t just go down. At least, that’s what he tells himself, but he realizes he may be surprisingly wrong when, over dinner, Donghyuk says, “I thought you didn’t like him?”  
  
“What,” Junhwe says, irritably, because Donghyuk’s wearing his look of concern and it’s just not something Junhwe wants to deflect today. He wants to spend the rest of today cycling through the rest of his collection of Feel Good movies and staunchly ignore the fact that he has assignments to complete.  
  
“Bobby,” Donghyuk says, “didn’t you say that you—“  
  
“I know what I said,” Junhwe cuts in. Donghyuk looks a little surprised, but not entirely unused to Junhwe’s brash manner. It’s times like these when Junhwe wonders why Donghyuk hasn’t just given up and made friends with better, more well-adjusted people. “Look, I just have a lot of work to finish—“  
  
“This is what you said the last time you were dumped,” Donghyuk, astutely enough, points out.  
  
“Okay, _look_ ,” Junhwe repeats insistently, through a mouthful of Chinese fried rice, “I have, um, just been handed a bad grade?”  
  
“Sl _iiii_ ghtly more believable,” Donghyuk critics, with a sincere expression.  
  
“Fuck you,” Junhwe concludes. “My mom raised me to be silent when I’m eating. Gotta respect your food. This chicken died to become your—”  
  
“You’re really not helping yourself here,” Donghyuk says, fixing him with a look. Honestly, if the guy flunked out of his engineering degree, he could take up a full time position as some sort of fortune teller specializing in patronizing the fuck out of his customers. Junhwe could write a solid testimony built off years of experience.  
  
“Nothing’s wrong,” Junhwe finally says, defeated. “Maybe a little bit is wrong.” If Junhwe’s phone’s currently wedged between his mattress and his bedframe, it’s one hundred percent because he wants to focus on his studies. “But it’s nothing I can’t handle. I’m good at this stuff.”  
  
Donghyuk doesn’t budge.  
  
“I’m moderately okay enough at this stuff to survive it in the long run,” Junhwe concedes. “Stop worrying about me. You’re gonna get wrinkles, then Yunhyeong’s gonna dump you.”  
  
“Yunhyeong’s not going to dump me,” Donghyuk says, with a confidence that inspires Junhwe to want to break something. Not for the fact that he’s jealous of their relationship, no, not theirs specifically, but that Donghyuk can say that so easily when Junhwe has troubles getting someone he likes to even reciprocate. “Which might indicate that I’m actually good at relationship advi—“  
  
“No,” Junhwe flat out rejects. He spears a piece of sweet and sour pork, reaching across the table to shove it in Donghyuk’s mouth. “I appreciate the effort, but no. No amount of you telling me I should talk to him is going to work. I need—“  
  
“—to pretend he doesn’t exist, never existed, and preferably will no longer exist in your life, right?” Donghyuk says, around a mouthful of pork. “I know. Let me help you.”  
  
“Must you sound like the fucking Dalai Lama every time you speak?” Junhwe questions, sliding back into his seat. “But yeah, that.”  
  
“Not that I’m endorsing this sort of—“ Junhwe narrows his eyes, and Donghyuk quickly backpedals “— _but_ we can bring in the ice-cream and the Studio Ghibli.”  
  
“It’s not _that_ serious,” Junhwe says nonchalantly, because he’d dated his ex for the span of several months, but he’d only known Bobby for less than a month. If the sort of pining that came with knowing him for this long was Studio Ghibli level, then Junhwe was well and truly pathetic.  
  
“Alright, we can bring in the pizza and the Lord of the Rings,” Donghyuk says cajolingly.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
Junhwe can tell that Donghyuk and Yunhyeong are trying to be sensitive of his feelings because they’re sitting on the couch with enough distance between them to fit a small child and a large elephant in the room.  
  
“Knock it off,” he says, the moment Donghyuk comes back from his popcorn run between breaks. “Just do what you guys normally do. Don’t make this weird.”  
  
Yunhyeong and Donghyuk exchange looks, then tentatively start holding hands, as though they’re meeting their in-laws for the first time. Junhwe rolls his eyes, and he rolls his eyes even harder when Yunhyeong tries to take his hand too.  
  
“Fuck off, you’re ruining this experience,” Junhwe snipes, but he sullenly settles in a little closer to Yunhyeong when the last movie starts. If anyone asks, it’s because Yunhyeong’s lap is the designated popcorn bowl parking space.  
  
“Y’know,” Yunhyeong says, suddenly, “it would help if Aragon talked to Arwen about his feelings.”  
  
“... yeah,” Donghyuk agrees, “they could’ve stopped this whole _migrating to a different world and breaking up forever_ type thing.”  
  
Junhwe stiffens, resisting the urge to even try to glare at them. The trick is to pretend he has no idea what’s going at all. For all he knows, they could be speaking Elvish.  
  
“I mean, if Aragon understood earlier on that Arwen was willing to give up immortality and kinship for him—“  
  
“—could’ve saved a lot of time and war effort,” Donghyuk agrees. “Gandalf didn’t even have to die.”  
  
“Are you trying to say you want to be Gandalf in this situation?” Junhwe asks. “Because if murder wasn’t illegal—“  
  
“This threat no longer works when you’re making it for the thousandth time, Junhwe,” Yunhyeong says placatingly, patting his shoulder. It’s times like these that Junhwe feels immeasurably like a child. How could it be that his best friend and his other sort of best friend have this shit sorted out, and here Junhwe was still trying to figure out how to get what he wants and what Bobby wants on the same damn level with minimum embarrassment and maximum ease?  
  
“I thought we agreed to let this go,” Junhwe says, forcefully making eye contact with a sheepish Donghyuk.  
  
“I can hear your phone buzzing,” Donghyuk says. “Like, six hundred times.”  
  
“I don’t hear anything.”  
  
“Not through your denial,” Yunhyeong quips. “Seriously, just text the guy and tell him you’re not interested.”  
  
And then there’s that. Junhwe’s mostly just hoping Bobby gets the message and goes away of his own accord, no conversation necessary.  
  
“If I text him, will you guys shut up and let me watch this in peace?”  
  
“Yes,” both of them reply in unison, because it’s obviously not enough that Junhwe’s been rejected. Of course not. Of course he has to take this rejection politely with both hands, and throw in a smile as he waves good bye. _Of course_.  
  
“Fine,” Junhwe grumbles, reaching over to smack the spacebar on Donghyuk’s laptop a little more forcefully than strictly necessary. He makes a show of getting off the couch and grabbing his phone, straight away unlocking it instead of dwelling on the messages (but his eyes catch on a few anyway, most of which were in the vein of _you’re not dead right_ and _did you wake up this morning_ and _look what I had for lunch_ and _has the eagle been snatched_ ) and goes straight to type out _busy, will reply when i can_ and quickly hits send, returning his phone back into its optimum position between his mattress and his headboard. “Happy?”  
  
“I mean, a longer heartfelt message would’ve been ni—“ Yunhyeong begins.  
  
“Don’t push your luck,” Junhwe says warningly, making a beeline back to his spot. “That’s my quota for today.”  
  



	4. Chapter 4

After that, Bobby’s texts peter out quickly. Junhwe throws himself head first into his essays. By which he means that he spends a lot of time procrastinating and visiting overpriced coffee shops under the guise of productivity and efficiency. Once, however, he enters a Starbucks blasting one of Bobby’s mellower songs, and he leaves immediately. That’s the day that he realizes that, try as he might to be okay with it, he’s pretty damn bitter about this whole affair.  
  
(And if he spends some time questioning where it’d all gone wrong, then it’s really more for review and improvement towards the future rather than regret.)  
  
To top it all off, the following week, Yunhyeong comes down with a bad case of the flu, which means Junhwe spends his whole time in his room in danger of becoming the shell of a man Yunhyeong’s slowly turning into. At least Donghyuk’s taking enough responsibility to spend time to nurture him back to health. It’s frankly pretty sickening to glance up his laptop and watch Donghyuk feed Yunhyeong spoon after spoon of hot porridge. First of all, it’s _unhealthy_ to sit that close to a sick person and— oh, okay, Donghyuk’s clearly courting death when he _kisses_ Yunhyeong. Junhwe rolls his eyes and stays in his, hopefully, slightly more sterile side of the room.  
  
He spends the whole of his Friday trying to remember that he has a social circle outside beyond the two of them by accepting an invitation to dinner with his course mates, and then remembers exactly why he’s kept his social circle fairly small and tight-knit. By the time he returns, he’s grumpy and slightly wet from the light rain that’d begun the moment he left the campus restaurant.  
  
“Get this,” he starts, dropping his coat by the door, “remember that guy in freshmen year who tried t—“  
  
“Yo.” Junhwe’s eyes snap up. He’d been out in that rain for a couple of minutes, but certainly not long enough to start hallucinating. “So you _are_ alive.”  
  
“Hi,” Donghyuk calls out, with a jaunty wave from Yunhyeong’s bed. “He just dropped by.”  
  
“You’ve _got_ to be kidding me,” Junhwe accidentally says aloud, because he’s blinked and blinked again and Bobby’s still right there on his bed.  
  
“We’d leave you two alone,” Yunhyeong rasps out, “but I’m kind of—“  
  
“Yeah, I get it, on your last legs,” Junhwe finishes, chucking his bag over to the couch. He’d expected a warm shower and a night of listening to Yunhyeong cough, but he supposes even _that’s_ kind of a luxury in comparison to his current situation. “What’re you doing here?”  
  
“You weren’t answering your texts,” Bobby replies slowly, spread out across Junhwe’s bed like it _isn’t Junhwe’s bed_. “I was getting worried.”  
  
“I thought I told you I was busy.”  
  
“That hasn’t exactly stopped you before,” Bobby points out, finally sitting up. This is going to be the night Junhwe finally snaps, he can just feel it. It doesn’t seem like Bobby’s intending on budging any time soon, and Junhwe would rather die than have this entire conversation in front of his friends. He’s honestly tempted to just snag his bag and fuck off to one of the other rooms on this floor, but then he’d have to face a lifetime of Donghyuk hounding his ass about Proper Etiquette and How To End Things Civilly. Between that and the talk he’s going to have with Bobby...  
  
“Out,” Junhwe says, pushing open the door, “c’mon, I’m not letting these voyeurs sit on this in glee.”  
  
“We’re not—“ Donghyuk protests, but Junhwe clears his throat loudly and Bobby complies, hopping off his bed to follow Junhwe out into the corridor.  
  
“Okay, you’ve seen my face,” Junhwe starts, before the entire thing becomes entirely too awkward and Junhwe is forced to scale down the five storeys to escape, “are you satisfied?”  
  
“I thought you were dating him,” Bobby suddenly says instead, throwing Junhwe completely off. “Donghyuk, the smiley one, not that one who looks like he should be in medical care.”  
  
Junhwe’s so speechless he ends up just gaping at Bobby. In what universe has he ever indicated that he’d ever dated Kim Donghyuk? And in which universe does Yunhyeong not appear and end up sweeping Donghyuk off his feet like one of Junhwe’s sister’s disgustingly cheesy mangas (that Junhwe’s never read, mind you)?  
  
“Don’t look at me like that,” Bobby says, rubbing a hand over his face sheepishly, then dragging his fingers through his hair. “You tweeted a photo of him with heart emoticons attached to it. _You_. _Heart_ emoticons.”  
  
“I don’t have a twitter account,” is what Junhwe ends up with instead, his mind running a mile a minute, trying to piece together everything that Bobby’s telling him. Which _means_ — and _that_ conversation— _so_ Junhwe’s not completely hopeless in this department, after all.  
  
“I figured when I knocked the door and your friends were in the middle of—“ Bobby makes gestures with his hands that suggests that he’s just been on the receiving end of one of their toothache inducing exchanges “—and I thought, does Junhwe know about this? But then they started talking and—they’re way more friendly than you, by the way, how did that happen?—and they told me they were the ones who messaged me.”  
  
Bobby’s saying all of this like he expects Junhwe to be able to respond succinctly when Junhwe can’t even follow point A to point B without getting lost. Besides, he doesn’t want to make a mistake again. He doesn’t want to make any moves until Bobby _at least_ straight up proffers a confession by way of sky-writing, or something else as big and obnoxious and undeniably real.  
  
“So,” Bobby flounders, leaning back against the wet railing. Almost immediately, he looks like he regrets it when the rain soaks through his hoodie, but his smug smile wavers for only a second before it’s back on in full force. “Say something, don’t make me do all the leg work here.”  
  
“I heard your call at the studio,” Junhwe says, figuring that all the bets are up on the table now. “And you said—“  
  
“—yeah, about that,” Bobby clarifies, “I thought, I mean, you were _attached_. I can’t do that to someone else, least of all someone whom you thought was worthy of heart emoticons.”  
  
“Why the hell are you so obsessed with that?”  
  
“ _And_ ,” Bobby soldiers on, ignoring Junhwe, “Hanbin and Jinhwan were on my ass for it. Told me that you were off limits, no matter how much I liked you. Told me they were gonna disown me if I tried something funny.”  
  
“Wait, back up a bit, repeat your second sentence.”  
  
“Hanbin and Jinhwan were on my ass?”  
  
“No, the one after that.”  
  
“Told me you were off limits?”  
  
“ _After_ that.”  
  
“I like you.”  
  
And there it is, out in the open, slightly drowned out by the sounds of rain and a rather loud outdoor party in the distance.  
  
“Huh,” Junhwe says, chest tightening suspiciously. It’s probably indigestion from his dinner earlier.  
  
“‘ _Huh’_? That’s all you have to say?” Bobby teases, though it’s pretty obvious from his expression that he’s nervous. And if the bastard can be stupid about one thing—honestly, thinking that Junhwe could ever cheat on someone?—then Junhwe can pretend to be stupid about this too.  
  
“Huh,” Junhwe repeats, crossing his arm and leaning back against the wall. “Interesting.”  
  
“... now you’re just being a dick.” Bobby takes one step closer. “I know for a fact there’s a reason why you’ve been ignoring me. Your friends tattled.”  
  
“What are you, _five_? Tattled? Really?”  
  
“ _He’s been really beat up over this_ ,” Bobby imitates as he advances slowly forward. Junhwe doesn’t even bother guessing who he’s referring to. He’s going to kill them both.  
  
“I’m going to kill them both,” Junhwe announces loudly, swallowing when Bobby comes alarmingly close to him. “It’s been a long time coming. I’ve been looking up methods to dispose bodies discreetly and it’s gonna be hard trying to hide our connection but I thin— _mmph_.” The rest of Junhwe’s sentence is smothered when Bobby suddenly kisses him and it’s— well, it’s not what Junhwe had imagined it to be, because Bobby’s nose is mashed kind of uncomfortably against his, and Bobby’s _teeth_ are digging a little too hard into his lips. In fact, the whole thing’s kinda bad for his posture, so Junhwe plants a hand on Bobby’s chest and pushes him gently away.  
  
“This isn’t your first time, is it?” he questions challengingly, curling his fingers to fist the front of Bobby’s hoodie loosely. “Because I have questions.”  
  
“ _Now_ you have questions?” Bobby asks, and he’s so close Junhwe can feel the warmth radiating off of him, especially since Junhwe’s still pretty much damp. “ _Now_?”  
  
“Now,” Junhwe reiterates, just to be annoying, but he lets Bobby puts his hands on Junhwe’s hips, let’s Bobby grip his chin in an irritatingly smug manner, “problem?”  
  
“Yeah.” And then Bobby’s kissing him again. Properly, this time. Or, fiercely. That works too, and the next thing Junhwe knows, he’s got a hand up the back of Bobby’s shirt, planted firmly on the small of his back, and Bobby’s actively palming his ass, sending his cognitive functions flying out of the window. That’s probably why it takes him a while to realize that there are people watching them, and people actually _cheering_ them on.  
  
“This is not,” Junhwe says breathlessly as he breaks the kiss, trying his hardest not to glance over at the handful of people they’d garnered as audience, “how I envisioned it to be.”  
  
“Yeah, Junhwe!” one of them shrieks. Junhwe recognizes Suhyun’s voice. He’s never going to be able to live this down. He’s never going to be able to walk around in campus with his head held high. _Never_. But, the trade off _is_ Bobby’s hand slipping smoothly into his back pocket, so maybe it’s not all that bad. “I knew you had it in you!”  
  
“I mean, I _perform_ for a living, and I can confidently tell you that this isn’t how I planned it to be either,” Bobby says. The bastard has the luck of having his face coincidentally tilted away from their watchful eyes.  
  
“Let’s make a break for it?” Junhwe suggests a beat too late, because Bobby’s already grabbing his hand and making a beeline straight back to Junhwe’s room, rapping the door impatiently.  
  
“You can all leave now,” Junhwe informs the crowd, as the door swings open a little too quickly to be natural, a grinning Donghyuk greeting them both.  
  
“Had fun? Thought you’d stay out late,” Donghyuk muses, stepping aside as Junhwe forces his way in, pulling Bobby in with him. He closes his eyes and tries to remember the serenity prayer as the crowd bursts into applause behind him.  
  
“Fuck off,” Junhwe says shortly, both to Donghyuk and the serenity prayer, as Bobby says, “Hell yeah.” They exchange looks of amusement and Junhwe can already tell that he’s gonna be in for one hell of a ride.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
As it turns out, dating Bobby is exactly the same as not dating Bobby. The biggest difference is a marked increase in shirtlessness. And some pantslessness, later on, when Bobby’s apartment is devoid of nosy friends and flatmates, but mostly the shirtlessness, because Junhwe’s starting to learn that Bobby’s default state of being is nude.  
  
“Get used to it,” Hanbin tells him as Chanwoo pats his shoulder when Junhwe walks in one day and Bobby’s wearing nothing but his boxers and a ridiculous Winnie-the-Pooh blanket. Junhwe honestly thinks he’s never heard more useless advice—he doesn’t have to get used to something he enjoys, although the blanket kinda ruined things a little.  
  
The second difference makes itself known when Junhwe, tragically, catches Yunhyeong’s bug. He wakes up coughing and gasping, his chest set aflame. Over the course of the day, it’s clearly evident that Yunhyeong’s straight up, baton-passed the godamn flu to him, because while Yunhyeong’s running around the room, chipper as fuck, Junhwe feels like death has finally come for him.  
  
“You’re not sick, are you?” Donghyuk asks as they’re dressing to go out for dinner. It’s not a particularly cold day, but Junhwe finds himself in three layers of clothing with a scarf on as he stubbornly insists, “No.” Still, dinner tastes like rubber that Junhwe nearly falls asleep on, so he doesn’t try to fight it when Yunhyeong later forces him into bed early and bans him from his laptop.  
  
The next morning, he wakes up to the sound of someone alternating between scribbling and typing away at a keyboard, accompanied with occasional bursts of music. They’ve worked side by side enough times for Junhwe to immediately recognize that it’s Bobby and he groans, rolling over to stick his face under his blankets. He feels -2% of his usual self and he’s pretty sure that, overnight, his body had transformed into some kind of deformed pancake, which means that he’s in no mood to deal with Bobby’s cheerful groping. What he wants, instead, is for Yunhyeong to tip-toe around him like he’s done every time Junhwe falls sick, and to wake up to magically find food on his bedside table. Appropriate, sick people food.  
  
Either Donghyuk and Yunhyeong told him, or Bobby’s really telepathic, because he’s quiet throughout their entire exchange, talking only when Junhwe asks where his traitor roommate and bestfriend are (“They told me this is a test for our relationship and went out.”) and to ask Junhwe how he’s feeling (“How the hell do you think I’m feeling?”) and if there’s anything Bobby can do to make him feel better (which, okay, he’d thrown in several phrases of the _I heard blowjobs clear blocked noses_ variety) _and_ he comes up with sick people food, somehow.  
  
“I’m dreaming, aren’t I?” Junhwe mumbles, a little later when he’s doped up on flu meds with his head pillowed on Bobby’s thigh. Bobby’s put on _200 Pounds of Beauty_ and Junhwe can feel himself growing increasingly drowsy and marginally less uncomfortable than when he’d woken up. Even to his addled brain, he recognizes this as effort on Bobby’s part. And it’s nice not having to be miserably alone when you’re sick. It’s nice discovering that no matter how grumpy he gets, Bobby’s response is a consistent amused grin and a brush of his knuckles to Junhwe’s cheek.  
  
“If you were, you have a pretty shit imagination,” Bobby comments, lifting the hand he has in Junhwe’s hair to flip a page on whatever the hell he’s working on.  
  
“Oh, yeah, kick a man while he’s down.”  
  
“Well, you won’t let me kiss you.” Junhwe glances up to meet Bobby’s gaze, if only so Bobby can see him rolling his eyes. “And now you look catatonic. If you die before I can—“  
  
“Shut the fuck up, I’m suffering. Put your hand back,” Junhwe orders, shifting in closer. Bobby complies easily, brushing Junhwe’s hair back to place a cool hand against the side of Junhwe’s face that feels like sweet, sweet relief. He blames it on his weakened defenses when he mumbles a quiet, “Thanks,” because Bobby’s solid and warm and comforting and Junhwe has spent most of his time sick a crochety hermit that has even Donghyuk shying away.  
  
Bobby makes a noise of surprise that has Junhwe cracking an eye open to glance up curiously at him. “You’re not really what I expected,” Bobby concludes, after a moment of patting Junhwe’s hair in blissful silence. “Not that that’s a bad thing.”  
  
“That’s reassuring, thanks,” Junhwe repeats again, this time with more sarcasm, and then Bobby’s leaning over to trail soft kisses down the side of Junhwe’s face to his lips. If he thought his face was warm before, Bobby’s kisses feel searing hot against his skin, leaving him stupidly breathless. “You’re gonna fall sick.”  
  
“Maybe that’s my plan,” Bobby murmurs against his lips, his thumb drawing soothingly across Junhwe’s hairline. “Maybe I just want you to be at my beck and call.” Junhwe snorts, but then Bobby’s kissing him again and he can’t find it in him to resist. It’s intoxicating, rendering him light-headed in a way that has nothing to do with illness and everything to do with the fact that it’s Bobby. And if the guy wants to court death by catching the flu, then who’s Junhwe to stop him?  
  
“You wish,” he grumbles, several minutes later, fingers curled possessively over the back of Bobby’s neck. Like this, all Junhwe can see is Bobby’s face, grinning obnoxiously down at him. “That’s why you have Chanwoo.”  
  
“He’s a _paid intern_ and paid interns don’t give naked backrubs.”  
  
“... why do you have the weirdest requests?”  
  
“Then why do you always do it anyway?”  
  
“Fuck you,” Junhwe concludes after a beat because he had, in fact, given Bobby a naked backrub. Never again, clearly. He pushes Bobby away with a palm to his chest, but catches Bobby’s hand in his. “I’m going to sleep. Don’t move, I’m comfortable.”  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
Junhwe waits for the other shoe to drop.  
  
It’s not that he’s insecure in relationships, far from that, even, but he’s never dated a guy like Bobby. He’s never dated a guy who’s taken him around an entire building and introduced him proudly to everyone which comes with the fact that he knows everyone in the godamn building. He’s never dated a guy who makes friends as easily as he breathes. He’s never dated a guy who, god-to-honestly, writes songs about him (okay, he’d dated that horrible poet in highschool for two weeks but using the word _poet_ might be a bit of a stretch) and proceeds to shamelessly serenade Junhwe in front of his friends. He’s never dated a guy who turns up, unannounced, when Junhwe’s bitching about working through the night, ready to buckle down and distract Junhwe when a breakdown is imminent.  
  
It’s all a little too fantastical for Junhwe’s tastes, because Junhwe’s nothing but realistic. This can’t be real. And even if it were real, this can’t be something that can be sustained for a prolonged period of time, no _fucking way_. Suhyun tells him he’s a pessimist, again, but Junhwe rolls his eyes because he’s just being realistic. Break-ups hurt like hell; even when his ex smelt like nacho cheese 98% of the time, Junhwe’d spent a substantial amount of time mourning him, not to mention how hard he’d fall for someone like Bobby who seems more mirage than man.  
  
See, Junhwe’s always panned his life out to be nothing extraordinary. If he’d have guessed the autobiography he was to write at aged 50, it’d have read something like _after getting punched in grade school, Junhwe mostly stuck to what he knew_ and _most of his friends and family are quoted to have said some variation of, “He’s alright, I guess,”_ and there would be a small section on Why Junhwe’s Really Good With Kids featuring his sister unforgettably saying, “You’re only good with them because you’re exactly like them.” Never in his life did he imagine he’d be standing backstage, in the eye of the storm, watching Bobby perform his heart out to a large, enthused crowd. Junhwe finds himself gaping to the point that he has to look away more than once, that he gets a little too uncomfortably hot even as he’s surrounded by Bobby’s friends (and some family), which is just wildly inappropriate and he’s _definitely_ getting Bobby back after that.  
  
The complete-strangers-walking-up-to-them-and-conversing-with-Bobby thing never really stops happening either, unless Bobby’s intentionally gone out dressed like a cotton swab or a gaudy tourist. It makes everything feel surreal, adds up to the list of _why me?_ Junhwe isn’t even aware he’s starting to calculate.  
  
So he makes bets with himself. It won’t last until the end of this month. It won’t last until after Junhwe’s birthday. It won’t last until the semester’s over. They won’t see their half-year anniversary (false, Junhwe actually scrimps and saves and takes Bobby out to a very nice restaurant that’s entirely wasted because his fans recognize him and he’s forced to cut short their date to give out signatures to everyone and their mothers, but Bobby makes it up by driving them both up a small secluded hill where Junhwe complains that people just come here to have sex and proceeds to have his brains blown the hell out). After a while, he forgets to count. After a while, Bobby weaves himself into the pattern of Junhwe’s life and becomes something more permanent.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i. if you’ve made it to this point thank you for enduring ???19k???? of self-indulgent junbob omfg  
> ii. istg there was meant to be more meta for living the high life but then junbob bickering overtook everything  
> iii. also junhwe reads hate comments online and actively responds to them with variations of well fuck you too (asshole) and he’s amassed a ton of memes. all their friends make a game of trying to figure out if a bobby stan is a bobby stan or junhwe going ham in the cmts again  
> iv. also potential sequel starting with “when they break-up, bobby doesn’t know what to do” but we’ll see :-)   
> v. ps hit me up on twitter (@hyonestly) i need junbob friends


End file.
